The Blue Bench
by Roper
Summary: A character's musings about his past.


A/N- just a one shot, had a moment of inspiration. For anyone waiting on 'None of this would have happened', I'm planning on finishing that up sometime this week so stay tooned.

A/N2- originally wrote as a Shep fic, but seeing as how I never outright say it, I guess you could take your pick of any of the atlantis boys.

THE BLUE BENCH

I remember the blue bench. An image eternally burned in my mind, a feeling that will never go away. I remember the first time I sat down on it, I punched Cameron Jenson in the stomach because he told Katie James that I liked her. I sat there for almost an hour and a half, I missed math, nowthat was torture. I studied everything from the people passing by to the peeling, blue paint that seemed to be shedding all over the floor. All the kids passing by giggled and stared and within a half hour, the whole school knew. To be seated on the blue bench was a sign of rebelion, that you'd done something wrong, always a popular topic among pre-teens. Eventually I sat down again, and again, and soon nobody giggled anymore, nobody stared. I was branded the rebel, the delinquant.

The sad thing was, nobody asked why. No one mentioned the bruises or the eratic behavior, no one saw the signs for help. Not that I meant them to, or wanted them to, it just would have been nice if someone made the effort.

To have been noticed would have meant I'd be taken away from my sisters and that was something I wouldn't allow. They needed me.

I was the third of five kids. I know what your thinking, were we catholic? Mormans? Really really horny? No no and no. An explaination for it all would have been nice, if my parents had an excuse for bringing five kids into the world and then giving them such a sorry excuse for an existance. I asked Mom once, she said that Dad wanted a big family. Guess that's the story of her life, huh? Letting her husband control her, destroy her, destroy the things she helped create. But I guess everybody has their flaws, Mom's were just more….permanently scaring, yes that's the word for it.

But she was a peach, she did loads for me and my sisters: calmed my sisters down when they could here me and Dad from upstairs, drove me to the hospital once a week, died of leukemia. You know, all those things that moms do. The only thing she never did was help, never stopped him. She never even ran away, at least if she'd done that I'd have had a bit more of a respect for her, even if she didn't take us with her.

So in my eyes it was just me and my sisters. I was the only boy so I felt that I needed to be their protector, I drove them all to school, beat up their cheating boyfriends, and distracted Dad if he got too close to hitting one of them. That was for me, I wouldn't let them take that pain.

Claire was the oldest, the stoic, smart yet hypertensive perfectionist, she always used to cook all the meals for us, Dad wasn't about to do it and Mom was always at work. Then came Sarah, the prettiest girl in school, cheerleader, dancer and the polar opposite of Claire. Claire and Sarah were in charge of rounding up our younger sisters and taking them upstairs when things got bad.

Next came me and, well you know about me. About five minutes after me –though I'm sure if you ask her she'll say it was four minutes- came Jamie. Jamie was my other half, always there to patch things together when I screwed them up. She had a voice like an angel. I could aways hear her while a lay there, trying not to look at the blood pooling around me, avoiding passing out at every kick. I would here her voice and remember that there was a reason I was put on this earth, to protect the six people huddled in my room, to keep them from the things that I'd suffered. I'd promise that one day I'd take them away from all of this and we could be happy, safe.

Susie always screamed when Sarah carried her up the stairs, she'd squirm and struggle in some lame attempt to get back downstairs, to help me. She'd cry into her pink flowery dress until it was soaked with tears. I remember that dress clear as day, Susie was the stereotypical girly girl, with lace and all the trimmings.

Despite the appeal of lingering in thoughts of my sisters, everytime I think of my past I think of that damn, blue bench. I've come to think I've never left that bench.

Amidst the public without an understanding stare in my direction, seen as a regular screw up, instead of one with the world on his shoulders.


End file.
